A Study of Social Factors Impacting Tendency towards Vandalism among Yasouj's High-School Students

Vandalism is a tangible، harmful and inevitable phenomenon، which exists as an emblem of social life in modern society. Sociologically، vandalism is defined as a kind of mentality aimed at destruction of public assets and accessories. This research considers social factors which may impact tendency to vandalism among Yasouj''s high-school students. In this study، a combination of sociological perspectives about deviation (such as Good''s theory about family structure and anomie theory، socialization approach، social control theory and the sub-cultural theory)، and theories of social psychology about deviation (such as Sutherland ’s theory about social learning and differential companion)، are applied together with theories of Vandalism (Hauber، Mozr and Clark) to examine the relationships between variables. It is a survey study، based on questionnaire. Statistical society is all high-school students in Yasouj. Using Cochran formula، sample size was estimated 400 cases. Random cluster sampling was used. Pearson’s tests show that the tendency towards Vandalism has significant relationships with socio-economic status، age، family size، and socialization، but does not have a significant relationship with gender. Multiple regression analysis shows that independent variables explain، overall، about 25 % of the variance of dependent variable.